Airbag (1997)

Thanks for the memories!

It's not great by any means, but it's a pretty good movie that didn't leave me filled with regret for investing time in it.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

This outlandish and ironic film was a big commercial hit in Spain . This is a fast crazy movie with lot of nutty situations , antics , bemusement and with a bunch of very hilarious roles . It deals with Juantxo (Karra Elejalde) who is engaged Araceli (Raquel Meroño) and he is about to celebrate the wedding . Dragged to a wild party by his friends Konradin (Fernando Guillén Cuervo) and Paco (Alberto San Juan) , he loses his valuable wedding ring inside the ass of a whore called Vanessa (Vicenta N'Dongo) . Mafioso whorehouse owner Villambrosa (Francisco Rabal) finds the ring and blackmails Juantxo . Meanwhile , Villambrosa's rival mobster , the mean dope lord Souza , (Luis Cuenca) sends "femme fatale" Fatima (Maria De Medeiros) to check things out . Juantxo and his friends are attempting to get the ring back and in the process get involved in a dangerous war among several factions that fight for a drug smuggling and a huge cash . As three Spanish suspected felons soon find dangers themselves in over their heads when they stumble with a bunch of gangsters and a violent war between two powerful bands of prostitution and drugs .Big-budgeted action film results to be a hilarious hallucinogenic comedy , with plenty of parody , surrealist events , bad taste , extreme spoof and gross-out but also with some brief moments being bold and funny . This disconcerting and overlong film includes various bizarre ironies that are fun , diverting and sometimes shocking . It is a comical and sometimes embarrassing account of a trio of unfortunate young people who set out in a bachelor party with unexpected consequences . Sitting in a strange middle ground between the completely absurd and the stylishly cool, this one is one of a hundred and one movies to try and capture the vibe of America's Quentin Tarantino . It turns out to be pleasantly fun that offers no intellectual stimulus whatsoever ; an exercise in pure amusement in which entertainment and fun are guaranteed . The characters are all odd , grotesque and weird and the film races on at incredible speed . Humor turns out to be sometimes cheesy and gross-out with numerous naughty and picaresque situations such as ridiculous jokes , blasphemy and adult scenes . However , it also contains uneven comedy , piggy humor , profanity and grossed issues . ¨Airbag¨ is followed by ¨Año Mariano¨ realized in similar style , also written and starred by Fernando Guillen Cuervo and Kara Elejalde , full of quirk roles , amazing events , abundant craziness and strange situations ; but there was also a larger theological question about ¨people manipulation¨ . The ensemble cast has some nice moments in the film , with three attractive and sympathetic players : Alberto San Juan , and Kara Elejalde , Fernando Guillen Cuervo , both of whom writers along with Juanma Bajo Ulloa . The secondary interpreters are pretty good and full of cameos , such as : Ramón Barea , Rosa Maria Sardà , Javier Bardem , Pilar Bardem , Luis Cuenca , Albert Pla , Santiago Segura , Vicenta N'Dongo , Manuel Manquiña , Manuel Tallafé , David Trueba , among others . And Francisco Rabal , a notorious and prestigious actor , he is one of the best reasons for watching the movie and the rest responded pretty well . The cinematography is glimmer as well as evocative , shot in several locations from Portugal , Madrid , Pamplona , and Gran Casino of Santander , Cantabria . This adequate photography was well made by Gonzalo Berridi , a good expert and deemed to be one of the best Spanish cameramen . In his long career , Gonzalo has photographed successes such as ¨El Viaje De Carol¨, ¨Amantes Circulo Polar¨ , ¨Ardilla Roja¨ , ¨Camaron¨ and ¨8 Apellidos Vascos¨. Director Juanma Bajo Ulloa had a lot of success in the way the film satirizes the peculiar roles ; however here abounds absurd and ridiculous moments . Juanma Bajo Ulloa is a nice but little prolific filmmaker . In 1989 he filmed his first movie in 35 mm , "The kingdom of Victor" that won the Goya of the Spanish academy to the best short movie . His first long film was the successful ¨Butterfly wings¨ in which appears a brief cameo by Karra Elejalde as a neighbour , this movie achieved numerous national and international prizes . As it won 3 Goyas of the Spanish academy , such as best first movie , actress and original screenplay . In 1993, he realized his second picture , ¨La Madre Muerta¨ or ¨Dead mother¨ , it won prizes in several Festivals like Venice and Montreal and considered to be his best by many of his aficionados . As it was released in the Festival of Cine of San Sebastian it won the first prize and subsequently won awards in many international festivals . In 1996 , he shot his third movie , "Airbag" , an action road-movie , became the biggest Spanish box-office hit of all time , being a real international success . However this success , he has been unable to make any other movie in the last 8 years . He attempted to adapt the Spanish comic hero "Capitán Trueno" but the producers turned him down , and being finally realized by Antonio Hernandez . Others projects couldn't be financed due to creative differences with producers. In 2004 he filmed in secret, and with his own money, his fourth movie, "Fragil", that will be released in 2005 but was a commercial flop . ¨Airbag¨ , rating : 5/10 . Acceptable and passable but excessive .

This movie doesn't make any sense whatsoever, but like culture classics like Animal House, National Lampoons Vacation, this road trip Spanish movie has what it takes to be a great classic if they decide to re-reprint the film. The plot basically is a bunch of friends trying to break in their best friend with a prostitute before his weeding, but in this case a very expensive family heirloom gets stuck inside the working girl.Now all they have to do is track the ring, because the whorehouse is a traveling one. On their quest to find the ring they get mix in with the mafia, Pimps, and a lot of cocaine. This movie is like a mix between Porky's and national Lampoons. hahahaha enjoy this movie is a fun one.

Imagine a single men party that you now when it starts, but you never imagine how it finishes. This is what happen in this comedy in which three friends are searching the wedding ring which one of them loose in the ass of a prostitute. They will be implicated in a gang war, during their search. You can see a collection of different Spanish types of people, and also some Portuguese. During the film you will see that what in the beginning seems to be complete casual lost, it's no so simple, and there is co nstant surprises during the 2 hours.I recommend you this film, and specially one of the bads guys, Pazos. It's incredible how he can mix words.

Skit? Farce? Take-off? Leg-pull? As if concocting an indigestible gag-laden pudding overbrimming with rich ingredients, Bajo Ulloa resorts to an over-the-top fusion and confusion of near-edible pranks, rather as if he had mixed a fair amount of 007 with a dash of The Godfather, a few spoonfuls of Al Capone, a sprinkling of Elliot Ness, and a liberal ladelling of tongue-in-cheek imagination, to cook up this inspired nonsensical triviality. Ah, he had good advice at hand: Karlos Arguiñano (Don Serafín) is a renowned restaurateur and TV-chef.Among mafia-looking types racing about the Iberian Peninsula, only stopping to visit mini-skirted brothels, several high-level rendezvous beside extravagant swimming-pools, a few odd explosions here and there, airbags going pop in cars over on their roofs, it is possible to glean from the fast moving action that some are looking for money and a valuable ring which, - how could you guess? – others are also hell-bent on getting their grubby maulers on. Now, if that does not sound like very coherent English, I can assure you that that is the last thing this Spanish film needs. Wallowing in excessive doses of whimsical indulgencies carried to the ultimate degree, the film canters along in all directions bar the one where you think it is going, thus decreeing that you should not resort to thinking, but simply limit yourself to a seemingly unrelated sequence of comic antics interspersed with a few fair-dinkum wenches, whilst trying not to break up into little bits as you roll about in hilarious mirth. Nothing should be taken at face-value; nothing should be taken seriously. Given such jaundiced view-point, if, like me, you might prefer less fantasious capers, you might be inclined to turn it off. However, this is precisely where the film defies you to do such a silly thing: you sit glued to your seat to the very end, because you, like me, are darned well not going to miss the next clownish round. So take your partners, as there is a bit of Strauss waltzing going on, and let yourself be driven headlong into bedlam and pandemonium. If you survive, take a stiff Alker-Seltzer (or even a double scotch), and carry on as beforehand as if nothing happened. Which, I think, is precisely what happened: nothing.Thereinafter, you can try to make up your mind whether to laugh at it, with it or for it. It's a free world………...